Steinberg e-licenser to Steinberg licensing

Cubase
1

Hello, I have been Cubase user from 20 years ago since Cubase Vst32, then Cubase SX till today have cubase pro 10.

Alter lot of years that Steinberg claimed the elicenser to avoid piracy, now seems nothing of that was really needed and is enough a online license.

But to get this license need to update before the end of the year or loose support. That is just a blackmail. Just beause users didn´t decide license politics. So the user is forced to pay when steinberg wants instead of the user needs.

Steinberg could easily convert actual ellicenser to new licenser (since the change was theire decision), instead is a blackmail where the user has to decide to abandon Cubase or stay without support, or buy. It´s clear a market strategy that is a blackmail. Because Steinber doesn´t want to change the elicenser to the new system after years of putting money on Steiinberg with updates.

Even more no discounts, so is time to go out this money forced drain.

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They couldn’t do that “easily” because it would require of them to go back and patch an arbitrary number of old Cubase versions to ensure compatibility with new licensing model.

Also, considering there were 2 or 3 big sales this year already and it was known USB eLicenser will be phased out for 2 or 3 years, you really had a number of chances to cheaply upgrade :frowning:

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Im sure if you outlined the situation and that you are on 10, Im thimking you could get a 50% off upgrade which is what I got…as per @antic604

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I have just realized the end of elicenser a weeks ago, and didn´t see the big sales.
There should be at least a disccount code for the upgrades. The licensing change was Steinber decision not user decision.

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I asked and have got a replied for a support team in spain prices was fixed now, no discount.

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so has it just stopped working? If you have a dongle…shouldnt it still be ok for at least a while?

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it´s working, but on the list there is limited support for elicenser. If it brokes I will loose it.
But the bottom issue is that I must upgrade before the end of 2024 or must buy the entire program? why? No sense. I have Cubase Pro 10, and have been user and updating from vst32.

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Same here…since Cubase atari 1989 hehe.

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The problem is that the old licenser will be unsupported and that you will have to pay full prices instead of update prices.
I really don’t understand why they wouldn’t just upgrade everyone to v12 (which is an “old” version by now anyway) and be done with it.
That would have been a user friendly decision without too much hassle and would have surely be met with very positive responses.

In my case, I contacted support in early september because I was basically broke and was asking if there would be another chance to upgrade from my v11, another sale, or a later possibility to change licensing and all I got was “we don’t know, possible, can’t say for sure” (as if they weren’t the company making these decisions). And no word or even hint about v14, which makes the upgrade even more expensive for me.
Maybe I could have gotten some Euros together to do the upgrade in september if the support would have said anything at all. So thanks for that, I guess.

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Yeah thats a good idea…probs anyone from v8 should auto v10 and go from there really

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For me seems a way to force things to win money. But the confidence can be loosed,

It has no sense for me that I must receive a lot of newslette for anything just to realize the big sale issue or the end of the elisencer this year.
“creative first” was the motto, and I was focused on making music. So I think should be fair to offer the same big sale price for the upgrade, till the end of this year just because this was a Steinberg decision, not user decision.
That make difference that I cannot divine this changes, and I was relaxed thinking could buy anytime next year. Dont understand why is ok if I upgrade now but now if I upgrade next year have to pay the full prize instead an upgrade? whats the sense of that?
As user I didn´t decide anything about the end of elicenser this year, and I have no received a email with this on the big sale time.

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SX is still the best and most completely well managed upgrade…I would still use that if it was compatible with plugins…no problem at all…super fast, great steiny plugs like mband compressor etc…I dont need bells and whistles…just solid productivity.

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Agree, unless you loose the dongle that will be no replace…

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There’s thousands of people who have Cubase 11 licenses sat on a dongle, so I don’t think there’s going to be a shortage any time soon, should your dongle break and you had to get a replacement to run C10.

Once the licensing system is dead it’s pretty much abandonware at that point anyway so if your dongle was to break, picking up a cheap dongle with C11 NFR on it, I would argue is justified.

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Still, you loose more than 300 bucks if you ever want to upgrade to a newer version after “end-of-service”.

Edit: And, while I wouldn’t go as far as to call it blackmail, this is not something forced by capitalism or the flying spaghetti monster, but a company decision. It’s not like there wouldn’t have been other options to handle this.

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Right!,

And I can understand that there may be lot of licenses even not activated or nor registered, but my license is registered on My Steinberg and on the elicenser, so there is no reason to justify why they can´t just change the license type to the new one, because it´s on their site “my steinberg”.
the ide of buying another old elicenser is another short term decision without support either. No sense.
As said before, the “change” and decision of change the license type is by steinberg so he is changing the rules, not the users.

I´m considering leaving it, because seems the only bottom issue is drain money endesdly.
Do you consider other alternatives? Logic?

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for me it´s concealed blackmail.
The company have combined soft license with elicenser during a lot of years. The elicense was an extra money dongle for the more expensive products like the soft licensing was for elements and so on, so the excuse about "there could be a lot of license outdate is absurd…, because the have been stored both soft and elicenser data till now.
So is nothing new relating support. If you lost a dongle o changed the computer support asked for the new elicenser data and gived the new keys.

So there is nothing new really just changing to a new version of software license. They could just give the equivalent new soft license on the version supported or instead give a update option that justifies it. The thing is that you have to update or you are out of support, and that´s not honest because “soft” licenses are not new either, they just changed the way that work, but the lack of support of the earlier is just “you have to dedice, continue upgrading or you are out”, so me is a concealed blackmail.
And I bet, on this times, many people has low reasons for updating every year, unless, they are “forced” to do.

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It was explained above, they’d need to update previous versions of Cubase to utilise the new licensing as it’s baked in to each module and function that you run.

This would mean creating an environment where they can load up the builds for each version and devote staff into going back through that code and repeating all the work they had to do in C12. And doing this alone may lead to the software not being able to run on the same O/S as it does now, due to the libraries and supporting files that the new licensing system requires.

It would be an impossible task to do this without additional funding, so if they were to do it and pass the costs on to end users it would likely be greater than just paying for an update to the new licensing system.

(IMO) Reaper is the only true alternative if you want to keep ownership of your software and not be at the mercy of paid updates. Plus the developers are active in communicating with users.

The likes of Logic and Studio One look like they will be heading further into the subscription model. Presonus already removed their forum, Apple you’re pretty much on your own and can’t communicate with developers as we can here.

This is the problem with DAW’s that are a suite of managed tools, there’s a lot of costs involved but that should be offset by the value you receive via the paid updates with new features and plugins.

If you don’t think there’s value in updating, and not prepared to take the route of a second hand dongle in future to keep yourself operating, Then you need to look elsewhere, clearly. But just be aware that this is your decision to corner yourself in this manner because you’ve decided it’s “blackmail”.

Personally, I think the best alternative to C10 is C14.

I don’t see many companies operating as Steinberg in regards to receiving a genuine perpetual license that only needs to be activated once per machine, and offering a forum like this for support and frequent Q&A sessions via their youtube channel.

Just consider your options carefully, it’s easy to only see the negatives.

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well, but no reason to stop support old dongles or old soft licences, why?

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It was explained above, they’d need to update previous versions of Cubase to utilise the new licensing as it’s baked in to each module and function that you run.

Yes, it’s clear that you can’t make older versions work with the new licenser. And it’s also clear that they can’t support the usb licensers forever, of course.

But making an entry in their databases that a user has registered an older Cubase version, so they can update to a newer version in the future shouldn’t be more complicated than an SQL dump and some coding.
I can’t imagine a company like Steinberg wouldn’t be able to do that.

1 Like